Eddie Redmayne Relives His Ill-Fated Kylo Ren Audition

Eddie Redmayne‘s currently hot on the press trail for Warner Bros.’ hopeful blockbuster Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, forced-smiling his way through the interview circuit to drum up buzz for the Harry Potter spinoff. But Uproxx’s Mike Ryan was more curious about following up on a comment the actor had made around this time last year, when he claimed on the Happy Sad Confused podcast that he had flubbed an audition for an unspecified character in Star Wars: The Force Awakens. Ryan was intent on getting to the bottom of the situation, and previewed the following tidbit from his upcoming interview:

You mention auditioning for the same roles as Domhnall Gleeson a lot. When you auditioned for Star Wars, did you audition for Hux?

No. So, I was going for, I think, for Adam Driver. They gave me like a Star Trek scene – or like something from Pride and Prejudice. It was one of those films. With films that top secret, they don’t give you the actual lines. So they give you a scene from Pride and Prejudice, but then they tell you you’re auditioning for the baddie. If you’re me, you then put some ridiculous voice on.

That was really a hilarious moment. Because it was Nina Gold, who I have to thank a lot because she’s cast me in several films. And she was just sitting there and I was trying again and again with different versions of my kind of “koohh paaaah” [Darth Vader breathing sound] voice. And after like ten shots she’s like, “You got anything else?” I was like, “No.”

That’s a tough break for Redmayne, though I like to think we’ve already seen what his Kylo Ren would have looked like. Lest any of us forget the stellar motion picture Jupiter Ascending, in which Redmayne memorably portrayed Balem Abrasax, a power-mad space emperor capable of speaking only via whisper or lung-top yelling. If he had nailed the audition for Kylo Ren, we never would have gotten the chance to experience this magic: